Former Aide Again Accuses Moseley-braun On Funds

Campaign Money Tapped, Suit Charges

December 12, 1996|By Ray Gibson, Tribune Staff Writer.

U.S. Sen. Carol Moseley-Braun's former campaign treasurer again accused the Democrat of using campaign funds for personal use in documents filed Wednesday in his suit to win nearly $200,000 in back pay.

Lawyers for the former treasurer, Earl Hopewell, alleged that Moseley-Braun billed her campaign $4,832 for airfare and hotel charges for a 1992 Las Vegas trip.

The filing also contended that aides tried to use campaign funds to pay for $6,000 in airfare for Moseley-Braun's 1992 trip to Hawaii and that she billed the campaign $4,068 for lodging at a luxury hotel during that trip.

The allegations are the latest in a three-month legal battle between Hopewell and Moseley-Braun.

Hopewell sued in September in Cook County Circuit Court, contending that he was unfairly fired March 1 after he objected to alleged irregularities with Moseley-Braun's campaign finances. He claims that he is due about $200,000 in back pay. The senator's committee has acknowledged in filings with federal elections officials that he is owed more than $100,000.

About a month after filing the suit, Hopewell filed court motions alleging that $39,000 in campaign contributions were spent to buy personal clothing, a stereo and jewelry.

"There is nothing to this. As far as I know, there were no improper requests for payments with respect to the campaign," Ira Rogul, one of Moseley-Braun's attorneys, said Wednesday. Attempts to reach Moseley-Braun were unsuccessful.

Moseley-Braun's use of a campaign credit card that was used to pay the hotel bill at the Four Seasons Resort on Maui had been disclosed previously to federal election authorities by the campaign. The campaign initially failed to disclose the expenditure but later amended its report.

In May, the Federal Election Commission released an audit of Moseley-Braun's campaign funds and concluded that $69,000 in expenditures on the credit cards "were used primarily for campaign-related expenses." The audit did not elaborate.

Hopewell also alleged that no one has paid the $6,000 tab for the first-class flight to Hawaii by Moseley-Braun and her former fiance and campaign manager, Kgosie Matthews.

Hopewell said that on Dec. 22, 1992, Moseley-Braun aides tried to get Hopewell to write a check from the campaign fund to pay the bill, but he refused.

Wednesday's court filings said the flight was booked through Mahogany Travel Services, a former South Side firm owned by Linda Johnson Rice, president of Johnson Publishing Co. Rice's lawyer, June Rhinehart, said the firm never collected on a debt owed by Moseley-Braun.